My New Camera - Kodak Zi8

Gone of the days where I have to make my Youtube nerdery with a crappy, out of date, point and shoot camera. I've upgraded to something more modern, although still very affordable. The Kodak Zi8 blogger style camcorder is perfect for the casual Youtuber like myself. It can film in full HD 1080p, 720p 60fps for action video, 720p, standard def, and can also take photos as you can see (but not that well.) The main drawback is the lack of internal memory on board. You can virtually do nothing without picking up an SD card for the cam. I spent 30$ on an 8GB SDHD card specifically made for HD video. Add that to the 107$ I spent for the camera and I like to think I got great value for my money. New models of these blogger cameras have flip screens that allow you to see what you are filming if the lens is pointed toward you. This camera doesn't have this, it is a little limiting. No big deal though, it is light years ahead of what I was using before. Look forward to full hd videos on my Youtube channel soon, actually they are up now. Thanks for reading.

My poor, poor, neglected blog...

The CDNGAMER Video Game Blog is the latchkey kid of the blogggg o' sphere. It comes home from school to find an empty house. It grabs a can of coke from the fridge and makes a P&J sandwich to make up for the crappy lunch its parents gave it to bring to school. It then sits down and plays an unhealthy amount of CoD until Mommy and Daddy come home a few hours later. It then gets yelled at because its homework isn't done and room not cleaned. Daddy then yells at Mommy for not getting dinner on the table fast enough. Mommy cries. Daddy swears. The little Blog says fuck it and plays more CoD. Life as a latchkey blog is rough.

Quick video here for my blog viewers. I picked up some bootleg GBa games along with a couple cheapo DS games. Enjoy and check out my Youtube channel for more video gamer videos. Thanks.

By the Numbers - YouTube Subs, Twitter Followers and Blog Hits

This is a little bit of a self-serving blog post, maybe even a pat on the back for a job well done...or maybe just done.

A few days ago I hit the magical 100 sub mark on YouTube. Yes, thank you thank you, please sit down, no need to shout. Now this is by no means a huge accomplishment given that there are far worse YouTubers than I sitting at 1000+subs. Great videos definitely play a large role in your sub count, but luck and timing are also important. Neither of those two characteristics are currently in my arsenal of tricks. Still, I'm happy about it. Someone out there actually likes what I'm doing. The fact that I only started my channel mid December, 2010 and that almost like clockwork three months afterward I hit 100 subs is encouraging. Also the fact that my camera is garbage, I have no reliable way to capture both video and audio at the same time, and I'm virtually broke at the moment tells me that once those issues get solved, I'll be well on my way to Youtube stardom, or maybe just nerdom.

The major bonus of being in the 100 sub club is that I can now upload videos longer than 15 minutes. Something tells me that 100 subs and being 100% copyright compliant means you get the right to upload vids longer than 15 minutes. The thing is, there are still more than a few larger channels that I follow that haven't be granted that privilege. Who knows why I can do it now and others can't. I'm not complaining. Now if I could only take videos longer than 11 minutes on my camera :-(

As far a video hits, the vast majority of my videos get about 50-60 hits in the first week they are up. The more popular ones keep up the same pace and continue to gain hits. The others still get views, just not as often. I'm OK with those numbers. Up to now, I haven't exactly put up anything Oscar worthy. Once the tech catches up to my artistic *laff* vision, the views will follow.

Not now I'm on the Twitter. I have almost 500 followers on Twitter. That means nothing. I got lot of those followers by following simply going on the Playstation Twitter account and following the first 2000 people on their list. About 400 followed back. Like I said, it doesn't mean anything. It is simply a tool to promote these blog posts, which in turn promotes my Youtube channel.

On to this blog. I'm not overly concerned by the numbers associated with this blog. It has been up for a month now and I have 252 hits on it as I type this. Good to see people checking out these posts. At the end of the day, this blog is just a fun and easy way to get my ideas out of my head and out there for mass consumption and then mass regurgitation. If people like these posts, great. If not, I'm not overly worried. They are fast and easy to do and eventually will be an great added feature to my Youtube channel once I get up past the 500 sub mark.

So, thanks to all my Youtube subbers, Twitter Shitters, and Blog readers. Numbers are ultimatly meaningless, but I am happy some of you are getting some information and enjoyment out of my art *laffagain*

Why I'm waiting to buy the Nintendo 3DS

Let's forget the fact that I'm broke for a little while. Let's just put that aside for a bit.

Although I'm not a huge fan of Nintendo or handheld systems, I do plan on eventually buying the new 3DS. I'm not waiting to pick up a used one, when I do spring for a 3DS it will be brand new out of the box. I've never really had any luck with used handheld systems. The only original Game Boy I owned had dead pixels. I only paid 5$ for it so I got what I paid for. The only Game Boy colour I owned was a $3.99 Value Village find. The speaker was crap. I got rid of it pretty quick. I currently own a crappy white GBA that I bought off eBay. Check out my YouTube videos, I did a cleaning up of that very system. It was rotten and to make matters worse, the left bumper doesn't work. I owned a pre used PSP briefly. The sound wasn't the best and it had been dropped more than once. That lasted a month before I got rid of it. So you see, me and used handhelds don't work well together.

I will own a 3DS, but not yet. I've heard too many people complain about vision problems and headaches after playing it. I'm sure that after a break from playing it, those negative effects will go away...but what if the added strain on my eyes permanently downgrades my vision? Probably nothing to worry about, but in my line of work poor eyesight is career suicide. I were a full face shield when I play ice hockey and even put up with people laughing at my expense when I play ball hockey with a pair of squash glasses on. Laugh at me if you like, I need to know more about these headaches and vision problems before I start playing a 3DS for hours at a time.

Beyond that, the selection of games for the North America release date is piss poor. I'd buy the Street Fighter game and that's about it. Japan had far better releases. I know eventually there will be more and better games for the system, which means waiting to pick it up won't kill me.

The price point for the system is perfectly fine for me. Many people complained about it but c'mon, this is 2011, 250$ for a video game system is nothing. I am however counting on some sort of price drop or sale around the time that the new PSP gets rolled out. At the very least, I'm looking for a game or two to be bundled up with it.

Colours. Yes, I used a U in colours. Why are black and blue the only colours available at launch? Nintendo is famous for the rainbow of colours that they release their systems in. Look at the GBA and N64 for Tom's sake. Although the blue is nice, I'd love something different. Green? Candy Pink? Something that pops. Mono black doesn't cut it anymore. I love black, but I need to feed my mind with colours (and u's!!)

Good on everyone who scored one at launch. I've enjoyed all the Youtube videos so far. You can expect my 3DS unboxing to happen in five-six months or so! 2000 and late!!!

Nintendo DS - cAN'T sTOP tILL yOU gET eNOUGH

The Nintendo DS is like a little piece of chicken that you get stuck in your teeth. You tongue at it for an hour, think you get it out, then notice it's still there later that night. Mmmmmmm chicken. Here is a brief and poorly constructed history of the Nintendo DS.


First came the clunky Nintendo DS. The design looked OK, but there were obvious flaws. It just didn't look right to me and was slightly heavier than it should of been for a handheld. A great little system, but unfinished in my opinion.


Next in line was the DS Lite, which should of been the first version of this system. Although it still looked like a little jewelry box, many of the design flaws that were found in the original DS were corrected. The system wasn't as heavy, the top and bottom actually looked like they belonged together and the overall build quality seemed to be better than the standard DS.


Never a company to sit around and wait for shit to happen, Nintendo again revolutionized the handheld console world by then releasing the DSi. This monster of a handheld had a camera! Exactly what you want in a handheld. You can play games, and take sneaky pictures of people at the same time. Perfect! Of course, you could no longer play GBA games in the DSi, but the pictures! Oh, the pictures you could take! In the end, this version was just another rehashed released from Nintendo. Pretty much a way to get parents to drop 200$ again on a system their snot nosed brat already owned. But hey, at least if you preorder the system you got one of these moderately attractive Japanese women with it. Something for Dad too!


You would think Nintendo would quit while they were ahead. I mean, they already had 3versions of the Nintendo DS that were pretty much the same machine other than a few upgrades (and downgrades.) Well, why stop there right?

"Just for shits and giggles, let's try to sell the DS to people again. Let's just make it bigger and include Brain Age with it. That'll get em in the stores!"

It happened, just like that. The DSi got supersized and hardcore Nintendo fans and dumb parents plopped down another 175$ or so for the fat DSi. Same system, but bigger, and with a few games preloaded that no one will play.. and that's it for the Nintendo DS. The lads at Nintendo will sit back for a couple of years and cook up a new handheld system. Something different, something fresh.



Whuh? 3D? C'mon.

El Cheap'o XBOX Pickups - The Youtube Video

Over the past couple of months I've been picking up drit cheap xbox games like they were going out of style. I actually don''t understand that saying; "like they were going out of style." If they were going out of style, why would anyone want them? Anyway, lots of games in this video. Some will never be played and were picked up just for the cases. Others will be loved and played with. Enjoy.

Weekly PlayAsia.com News - Buy Games, Help Japan

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The Definition of a Value Village Hit

Nuff said.

The "Getting rid of stuff I don't play video" on Youtube

I am FULL of it today. I've been back and forth from the computer and cleaning up for most of the day and it seem that every time I check Youtube out, someones video sparks a blog post from me. The first today was a little bit of a rant which I'm not happy about. The second was more of an observation. I'm hoping this one doesn't come across as being negative, but it probably will.

I'm subscribed to about 225 pretty good Youtubers. Most of them are good video makers, some are only subbed to because they subbed to my channel. Not sub for subs per say, just a common courtesy to newer Youtubers like myself. About once every three weeks or so a "Channel Update" or "Where I've been video" comes across my feed. A solid 50% of the time, those videos feature some poor dude trying to dance around why he had to take a break from Youtube and why 3/4 of his collection is now gone.

Body language is a dead giveaway. If someone is sitting in front of the camera and has their head down, unable to look into the lens, as he tries justify selling half his collection...he needs money...or his wife/girlfriend(s) has him by the shorty and curlies.

The whole "I don't play them anymore" line is another giveaway that something is up. All gamers have games that never get played. How often does Stadium Events for the NES get played? We buy games knowing they won't get played. Unless someone goes Tyler Durden...

Fuck off with your sofa units and string green stripe patterns, I say never be complete, I say stop being perfect, I say let... lets evolve, let the chips fall where they may.

...on themselves, odds are the reason they are selling off is because they need the cash.

Let's be clear here, I'm not criticizing people for doing this. I've sold any number of systems and games that I didn't want to only because I needed the cash. I've owned six PS2s for Pete's sake. I have no issue with people doing making these videos, and it is not my business to have an issue with it.

I just can't understand why people can't just say, "Shit, need the cash dudes," or "My wife called me a man-child and told me it was the games or her." No one needs to be ashamed because of that. I don't expect an explanation as to why people need the cash or how hot someones wife is that he'd ditch his games for her. Again, not my business. Dudes, we all know what's going on. Either don't make a video about it (best solution imo,) or stop trying to be cool in the videos. Most of us have been in similar situations, there is no fooling us.

T-minus three weeks till my self destruct video hits Youtube, watch for it and subscribe!

Game Store Snobs - A Victim's Story

So I was on my way over to a friend's house last night to play some NHL11 and NBA2K11 and figured I would stop off at the EB Games location near his place. I didn't want to spend more than 5$ on anything and would of been fine walking out of there with nothing.

I walked in and started looking through the reduced to clear GC, Xbox and PS2 games for a deal or two. The two dudes working there pretty much ignoring me and talked amongst themselves. Their conversation went something like this -

Dude1 - "We haven't sold much today. Rob called in and told us we need to 'sell' more"
Dude2 - "Hard to 'sell' games when there are no customers and the ones that do come in are cheap"

(this is where I really started to listen in, as I was buying on the cheap tonight)

Dude1 - "Everyone is saving for the 3DS I guess..."
Dude2 - "No people are just idiots and want something for nothing all the time..."

...and with that Dude2 turns to me and asks if I needed a hand. I flat out told him I was looking for deals. He was cool and pointed me in the direction of the reduced xbox games, but I kind of know what he was thinking. I poked around for 10 minutes or so before picking up a couple of games.

I brought up a 99cent copy of Namco Museum and a 99cent copy of Splinter Cell Double Agent, both for the original Xbox. Dude1 rang me in without saying much and didn't even ask if I had an EB card that would give me 10% off those games. I handed him my card and he rolled his eyes. 10% off $1.98 games = FTW. Just to piss the guy off more, I hauled out a pile of change. I paid with as many pennies as I could. What a dick move but I loved it! As I walked out with my epic purchases of the night, I heard the two dude mumble something to themselves and then giggle like little girls.

I was victimized! Not really, if I hated my job I'd probably have the same attitude. Shouldn't I get a pat on the back though? I mean, both those games are fully playable and at 99% each how could I go wrong?

Another Funny Youtube Gaming Community Trend

Last week I made a quick blog post about the whole Youtube "Payola" for shout outs trend that is taking over the gaming community. Today I noticed another odd trend that plagues the community. (Plague is too strong of a word but screw it, it's staying there!)

I woke up late today, 3:00PM. Ok, it was actually 4:00PM but that is only because of the time change. Anyway, I checked my Youtube channel to see what was going on and noticed I had a message. Cool. A fellow Youtube gamer sent me a message with the subject line "help." Now, the shit just hit the fan in Japan so I was assuming that this had something to do with that. Seldom right and wrong again. This Youtuber, who has close to 5000 subs, for some reason needed to point out to me that I wasn't subbed to his channel. I was friends with him, but only because he spam mailed me a few months ago with a friend invite. He wanted to know why I was his friend, but yet not subbed to him. He pointed out his 400+ videos and how professional they were. It almost sounded like he was dumbfounded as to why I wasn't subbed to his channel.

Here is the funny part, I had been subbed to his channel for months, ever since he spammed me with a friend invite. For some reason, he still felt the need to spam me again. Funny again, he couldn't even be bothered to subscribe to my channel.

I don't expect everyone to sub for sub, but if you are going to ask for a friend or sub, at least have the common respect to sub back. All these unwritten rules within the Youtube community have taken on a life of their own and sometimes push real life respect and courtesy aside. I really think sometimes people need to take Youtube a little less seriously and just think about how you would interact with someone in the real world before acting in the Youtube universe. This applies to everything; subs, comments, thumbs up, responding to comments, etc.

Now, at the end of the day, I'm not to worried about any of this. I do feel that the whole sub and friend thing on Youtube creates an interesting dynamic within any one specific community. This dude who spammed me expecting a sub, even though I was subbed...is a douche. His "pro style" videos are straight out of 1989, everything down to his denim shirt and mullet. I love the mullet, I had one that was pretty epic back in the day. The denim, dude the denim has got to go. Douchetastic.

(I have no intent to flame or call out Youtube users on this blog, as long as they are not being douchey. I reserve the right to blog about random douchery at any time. If you are offended by my douche-like blogging style or my use of the word douche, go lie down out of it.)

Fooling Around

Just fooling around with MSpaint and some Megadeth art. Copyright be damned! Eventually I'll redo this with Paintshop when I figure it out better.




Some obvious issues here but I like the concept of the reworking. More to come regardless of how bad they turn out lol.

Here is the first attempt, which turned out way better but was much simpler...

Club Nintendo Pickup Video and my Thoughts...

I received a package from Club Nintendo today and made a half-assed pickups/opening video for it. I claimed this reward from Club Nintendo about a week ago and was very happy with the turn around time. Well packaged and expedited to boot! What make that feet of shipping goodness all that much better, I didn't have to pay a cent for the shipping. How often does a rewards program of any kind A.) Process and ship your order within a week B.) Not charge you a penny for doing it? Very happy with Club Nintendo. It almost tempts me to by more Nintendo products. Almost. Full credit to them for offering these rewards all the while selling their games the cheapest of the three console companies. Here is my pickups video on Youtube ----

The DLC Dilemma

Hopefully this comes across as being less ranty than a couple of my previous posts. It probably won't, I'm an angry young man (cue the Billy Joel.) Actually, I'm probably not that young anymore.

I can remember a time when DLC stood for Delicious Licorice Candy, ok I made that up. DLC, or downloadable content, can be had for most new games releases these days. When DLC started to become popular, I initially thought was a great idea and a way to give games extra life. New maps, new characters and new weapons added to the games I was playing. My view of these DLCs changed soon after though.

More and more games are being released unfinished. Yes, they are fully playable and still pretty fun, but why is it that we are constantly downloading these patches to fix mistakes and bugs in the game? The only real explanation is that the games are being rushed into production and they never really get the finishing touches they need. What about map and mission DLCs? How many of these DLCs are simply material that either wasn't ready or didn't make the cut? It almost seems like I'm paying for half the game and that in order to get the full experience I need to spend an extra 24.99$ four months down the road to get the whole thing.

I have never personally bought a download like this, but I have heard that some DLC is actually on the disk when you buy it. When you buy the DLC, the download takes seconds and simply unlocks it for you. I doubt that the extra money being made by doing such things does gaming companies any good given so many gamers unhappiness towards such DLCs.

In the end, the current crop of gaming systems and their ability to easily link to the inter-web is both a blessing and a curse. We get to enjoy online gaming like never before. Of course, this access enables game developers to suck our wallets dry like never before.

YouTube Payola (Poor Grammar Alert)

No, this isn't a blog post about the Canadian rock band that were big (biggish)back in the 80's. This is about an odd trend that I first noticed about a month or so ago involving some of the giant sized gamer channels on Youtube. I won't mention them, but they are not hard to find.

It seems that most everyone in the gaming community wants to be a Youtube Partner. A lot of us will come right out and say it, others will be more coy about it. There are a few however that genuinely just put up videos for the fun of it. Maximum RD, Troubl8353 and Xfile2708 are among my favorites on Youtube. These cats just put up videos and really don't seem to care about potential $$$$ from Youtube. I like to think I fall in the same category as they do. I started out gung ho about making a stink load of $$ from the Tube, then after a little while I basically said screw that and release videos now for the fun of it. If Youtube wants to give me money eventually, great. Until then, screw them.

With everyone gone willy over YouTube Partnerships, it seems that people are willing to toss a little payola around to the big guys in order to get a shout out. A shout out from a 4000+sub Youtube Partner could mean what? An extra 100subs in a week? Probably more. I subbed one guy after he was shouted out by one of the BIGS. He went from 5subs to about 150 in a week. The guy had made 3 videos with a webcam circa 1998. In one video, the poor guy proudly showed off his collection (4 items) of Star Wars crap. He had a few Happy meal toys or something. What I'm getting at is that this guy got made by that one shout out. His videos blew and it didn't matter.

What is this payola all about you ask? I've seen some of the big Youtubers do package videos that contained up to 200$ worth of free swag. Not trades, not sales, FREE SWAG. The swag of course is in the form of video games and systems. I can't wrap my head around why you would pay to send people free stuff from your collection unless you fully comprehend that you are paying for a shout out and a sub from the elite of the gaming community. I find this beyond odd and can only shake my head when I see what some people are sending out.

Now don't get me wrong, I fully know that many people make great friends on YouTube and they they exchange gifts. I think that is great, but that isn't what I am talking about. I'm fully aware that trades go down on YouTube. Not talking about that either. Also, I'm not crapping on anyone for taking the free stuff. More power to you all. I'm not really even crapping on the senders, as long as they know that they are buying a shout out and don't expect anything more in return...and for the record, I've never seen a video by anyone asking for free stuff in return for a shout out...so what am I complaining about then...not sure anymore.

Youtube Payola seems to of taken on a life of its own within the gaming community. It's now just part of the way it works; part of unwritten rules or the code of conduct. Are we better off for it? In my opinion definitely not. Are we worse off? I haven't seen a problem or fight caused by it yet. You know one is coming though if someone doesn't get his shout out or unpackaging video. You really know what I would love to see once? One of the big guys in the community, I mean really big, set up a Paypal account and promise a shout out video for everyone who donates to some charity through that account. That would be pretty kick ass. Sadly, with my 57subs the children would go hungry and the whales would all die. You've got the eeeyyyyyyyyyyyeees of a strange-ah!

...and now, a word from our sponsor.

When I started this blog to exist alongside my Youtube channel...

http://www.youtube.com/user/CdnGamer

... I was given the option of adding Google's Adsense banners and whatnot to this page. I thought about it, and well, avoided that option like the plague. I have no beef with people adding them to their Blogger blog or Youtube videos, more power to you. I just kind of feel that the randomness of the ads take away from my art...errrr theme of my posts. I don't want ads for coupons on a blog about video games.

I went with another affiliation program. Play Asia .com's banners and ads fit the style of my blog and I feel they add to the reader's experience here. What better than to read about a video game, then be given a link to buy the game? Also, many of the games Play Asia stocks are imports and not often seen or talked about. You can learn from my blog and its ads! Not really but I do like the way they look. They also have weekly news feeds that I can post here. Here is this weeks, thx -----

Super Mario All-Stars Wii Rant

The definition of limited is "Confined or restricted within certain limits"

The definition of rant is "A speech or piece of writing that incites anger or violence"

The definition of poor writing is "starting out a piece of writing with definitions from a dictionary."

So now that we have that out of the way, this is my take on Nintendo's re release of Super Mario All-Stars for the Wii.

When I heard that Nintendo was releasing a "limited edition" SMAS Wii last December, I couldn't help but want one. Not because it is a great game or because I wanted to turn a profit from it. I kind of liked its limitedness. On release day I was lucky enough to of been passing by a 24h Walmart at 2:30am. I dropped in to see if they were on sale yet and sure enough, there had been people lined up at midnight. The cashier told me there was one case per Walmart available ,or 12ish per store. I bought the last two, a only 2.5h hours after they hit the shelves. I sold one to a friend at cost and opened/played the other.

Now, I won't get into what I thought of the game or the whole bundle. That is another post. I was just happy to have something in my collection that most people didn't. I felt for the people complaining online that couldn't get one, but that's life.

Well it wasn't a month before rumours hit the inter-web that Nintendo was going to make more SMAS Wii available to the public...the same frigging "limited edition" copy that sold out within hours. I know $$$ is the bottom line, but couldn't Nintendo of just released the game on the Virtual Console for people who wanted to play it? Couldn't they of just released to game alone without the CD and book? Could they of not told everyone that "limited edition" means "limited edition" and to try their luck with Nintendo's next limited edition offering?

As someone who owns a so called limited edition copy of SMAS Wii, I think this stinks. Later this month, the limited edition game I purchased will become a little less limited. Thanks Nintendo, fool me once...

Pack Bustin! Super Mario Galaxy Wii Style!

If you are like me, you love busting packs. Hockey cards, MMA cards, Magic the Gathering...they are all good. Myself along with a friend of my, The Game Dummy, busted a few packs of Wii Super Mario Galaxy cards for fun. Here is the nasty evidence as seen on our Youtube channels...

My South Korea Gaming Memoirs Vol. 1

Ah yes, South Korea. Without giving away my life's story, I spent a little over two years in the land of 2$ taxi rides and dried squid w/peanut butter snacks in movie theaters. I was teaching English in a Seoul suburb and making a very good living doing so. Let's say I did a lot of shopping while I was there. I really only pissed a small amount of money away of video games as I was worried about lugging it all around (three apartments in those two years, not to mention getting it back to Canada) as well as where to keep it while I was there. I did however make a twice monthly trip to the Yongsan area of Seoul, where there was nothing but games and electronics of all types to be seen. On my first trip to Yongsan in January of 2008 I found this ----




----the Korean NES! This isn't my picture, I robbed it off the inter-web from some dude named Spencer. That is however the same Korean NES that caught my eye that day, and every other time I saw it on my Yongsan adventures. It didn't sell the entire two years I was there. I looked at it often, wanted it, even figured out how to ask the dude how much it was in Korean. He wanted 100,000W for the system and Mario3 game. That's 95$ or so. I'm sure 60,000W would of done it, but I never bothered to haggle. I regret that now. Those things are mega rare.

They sold like crap in South Korea. By the time they arrived dealers were importing Famicoms and Hyundai had a Comboy system to play some form of NES games. Also a factor, South Korea wasn't as well off in the 80's as they are now. Remember, Korea was war ravaged only 30 years or so prior to the NES. I am willing to bet that same NES is still there today.

I plan on going back to the RoK this year, mark my words, I will have it!

Nintendo Baseball and Ben Ween

I grew up in a town of about 7000 people in Quebec. I'm not talking a suburb of Quebec City or Montreal, I'm talking about hard core French Catholic Quebec. We had one Greek family, who owned the Pizza joint. We also had an older Chinese couple who of course owned the Chinese restaurant. There was one Muslim dude, my science teacher and a couple of adopted black kids down the street. That was it as far as different flavors and ethnicity's go. As a ten year old, I only knew the term "Jew" from the bible. Jesus was a Jew, and they damn near killed him for it. Actually, they did kill him but the stubborn bastard re-spawned. Anyway, one day at school we were introduced to a new student, Ben Ween (spelling is wrong on Ween but I like it spelled that way so I'm going with it.) Ben was an odd, whiny kid from Florida. Picture Gilbert Godfrey as a 9 year old. The dude was a walking stereotype for Jews and Americans alike.

Ben and I got along ok. We hung out together because there wasn't that many English kids in town. The Anglos stuck together. He was a baseball fanatic. This kid had baseball cards going back to the 30's, including vintage Babe Ruth cards which I'm sure were eventually sold to pay for university or drugs, which ever came first. He even had a collection of old baseball mitts from the 20's and 30's. This kid was 9 years old. I appreciated his love for baseball and was glad to know someone who would go for a catch on a moments notice...although God forbid you make him run a bit. Gilbert Godfrey voice---"Why can't you throw the ball straight at me? Why am I running for the ball? You should go get that ball..."

Anyway, Ben was living with his mother who was A.) Lazy B.) Dumb C.) Didn't really care about anything but her massive hair. Obviously the cards and money came from his father still in Florida. Ben didn't have a NES, so he used mine as often as he could. This is where Ben and I eventually started having falling outs.

Renting games back in the day was the best. For 2.99$ you would be able to snag a game for a couple of days during the summer and have a load of fun with it. There was one summer that I think I must of rented about 10 different baseball games for the NES. Not because I wanted to, but because Ben Weeeeeeen found ways to trick me into it.

Example - Three of us decided to chip in 1.50$ each and get a game and some candy. Myself and the other dude figured we would send good ol' Ben up to the store get us a game while we got in a few games of Contra. Ben was told, and I remember this well, we told him, "Get something two people can play at one time, something new, not a sports game." Simple right? Twenty minutes later, Ben shows up with RBI Baseball, a game which we had rented at least 5 times before. When we asked him where the plan went wrong, Ben just started to whine "Oh, everything else was rented." I called BS. We played for the afternoon and got fed up with Ben crying that I was bunting inside the park home runs on him. He wasn't invited back. Oddly, Ben and his trashy mother left town and headed back to Florida just before the school year. I never saw him again, probably for the better.

For the record, I love all flavors, colours, races and religions but I am very aware that some stereotypes are 100% true. Like I said, Ben Weeeeeeeeeen was a walking stereotype, one that I will never play NES baseball with every again.

My First Gaming System - Colecovision

I remember the Christmas morning that I got my Colecovision very well. I ran down from my bedroom to find an up wrapped Coleco system sitting under the tree. It was a bigger box than any of the other gifts so I guess rather than waste a pile of wrapping paper on it my mother just stuck a bow and gift tag on it. The tag said, "To Family - From Santa." Family my ass, that was my system.

I had heard of video games from a friend who had an Atari. Keep in mind, most people didn't have video game systems back in the early 80's. You can't blame someone for not having a clue about them back in the day. I'm not sure why the old man never picked up an Atari as it was by far the more popular system. He has never been the most "in touch" kind of guy and really had no idea what was cool or en vogue. He is also cheap. Mega cheap. I'm guessing The Bay or Woolco had Colecovision systems and games on sale and not Atari. In the end, he made the right choice. I wasn't a fan of Atari and really still can't see what the attraction was/is.

Along with the basic system that year, I received a few games. Donkey Kong was obviously a pack in with the system. I also snagged Q-Bert, Pepper II, Zaxxon, and maybe one of Miner 49er, BC'sx Quest for Tires, or Montezuma Revenge. Really not sure which one I got that first Xmas.

I played the hell out of that thing. Even Mom got into it. She loved Q-Bert. As the year went on, I managed to pick up a few more games and accessory's for that system. My brother who was living on his own by now, would come home with a new game every couple of months or so. He added 2 Action controllers to the collection as well as Baseball, Football, Evolution and my favorite Coleco game of all -- Omega Race! My birthday that year brought be Turbo and the steering wheel. The following Xmas brought be Subrok, Congo Bongo, Carnival, 2 of the 3 mystery games mentioned in the previous paragraph along with the Roller Controller with the Slither pack in.

Also interesting, I picked up an Adam computer add on system that year. I really wasn't a fan of this. It was basically a bulky add on that never got used. I took a lot of heat that year for playing games on the Coleco (God forbid!) and not using the Adam word processor. I was like 7 years old, what the hell was I going to do with a word processor?

Anyway, the great fall of the video game industry soon came and Colecovision games were going on sale at our Woolco department store for 2.99$ each. I managed to snag games like Gorf, Smurfs and Cosmic Avenger among others. Sadly, that supply soon ran out.

I had a good run with the Coleco as a kid. It was one of the best gifts I had ever received in terms of how much use it got. Like all things these days, something bigger and better came along... the NES! But that is another blog post.

Here is where my story takes an ugly turn. After holding onto the Adam, Coleco, and 30ish games, and all the expansion modules for 20 years...after paying a moving company good money to lug it halfway across Canada, my father shot my Colecovision out. Not because it didn't work, because there suddenly was "no room"for it. Two years prior, I had bough a large Rubbermade tub to store everything. It was all in one clean, neat, tidy Rubbermade tub. He still threw it away. He kept 100+ worthless LPs (Dick Nolan, Kenny Rogers, Richard Smackers etc etc.) He kept furniture from the early 80's that was shunned away from the church flee market he tried to give it to. It was the most random and insane thing I have seen a so-called sane person do. To this day, I say that moment was the start of old age really affecting his mind. To make matters more irrational, he kept the game carts. He dug through that Rubbermade tub to salvage the game carts even though there would be no system to play them on. WTF? I think my father an I had the biggest argument we ever had that night when I found out. It just didn't make sense. It wasn't mentioned again after that night, not worth holding a grudge over silly video games, but I still can't figure it out.

In an equally stupid move, I listed the game carts on Ebay the next day. I scored almost 200$ from them but that still didn't make up for the loss. I should of just waited and calmed down. I would of still had the carts and could of picked up a new system.

He also randomly gave away an Apple Classic II computer. I wasn't pissed at that, but I wish I still had that also.

So there you have it, my late night Colecovision story. Odd that I remember it all so well. My memory is amazing, even though the vast amount of Diet Coke I drink has killed a few brain cells. I still haven't managed to pick up another Colecovision and only count two games in my collection. I think it might be time to welcome it back into the family.

Japanese Playstation Games Video

One of my first Youtube videos was a pickups video of nothing but Japanese Playstation games. I love this era of gaming and also the fact that some many great games were never released in North America, making them very hard to come by. Thanks for watching.



Buy Games/Classics/PSone™ at Play-Asia.com

BOOM! First blog post!

So it has come to this. After setting up a Youtube account to make nerdy videos about video games, then setting up a lame Twitter account to go with the nerdy Youtube videos --- I've now set up a blog to write about video games.

This actually isn't my first adventure in online journalism/nerdism. I wrote for the Crave Online website www.hockeysfuture.com. There, I was paid less than a penny a word to write about the prospects in the Minnesota Wild organisation. Form there I started to do the same with the Ottawa Senators and Edmonton Oilers briefly. I did work for many other teams on that site also. I like to think I did a pretty good job with the reviews I wrote, even though the Ottawa and Minnesota fans hated me. I wasn't kind to their teams or their prospects. Eventually, I got fed up with the amount of work each article took and the 150$ paypal payments they would send me monthly. Don't get me wrong, it was a great experience and the extra cash was good. It just wasn't worth the headache.

Here I am again, writing online. This time, I do exactly what I like. They can keep their pocket change. I'll write as often or as little as I like. This time, I'm going to write about something a little less polarizing - video games.

I guess I have been gaming all my life. I went from a Coleco, to a NES, to a Genesis, to Playstation etc etc. You get teh picture. I find myself now reinterested in a lot of the older games I once played and the many that I wasn't able to get my hands on.

Yadda yadda yadda. If I keep typing I won't have anything left for future posts. This is basically a quick intro of what I plan on doing here. I'll link this blog to my Shitter account as well as my youtube account. I am truly the king of all media, or at least the nerdiest. Thanks for checking this blog out, I hope you enjoy my posts and feel free to comment and check out my Youtube videos.